Winter may not start until tomorrow, but many around the world are already feeling its chill

A young couple share a tender moment in the cold in Moscow's Red Square on Dec. 20. A cold wave hit the Russian capital this week with temperatures dropping to 3F.

Iowa

Charlie Neibergall / AP

A local resident clears snow from his driveway after an overnight snowfall left many schools and businesses closed for the day on Dec. 20 in Urbandale, Iowa.

Bulgaria

Dimitar Dilkoff / AFP - Getty Images

A woman walks on a snow-covered road during a snowstorm near the town of Dobrich, Bulgaria, on Dec. 20. Violent snowstorms lashed Bulgaria's northeast Thursday, bringing road traffic to a standstill and shutting schools across the region.

Kansas

Orlin Wagner / AP

Early morning motorists travel west along I-70 and into a winter storm near Lawrence, Kan., on Dec. 20. The Midwest's first major snowstorm of the season swept across several states early Thursday, shuttering schools, creating treacherous roadways and threatening to slow down one of the nation's busiest airports ahead of the holiday weekend.

Kashmir

Farooq Khan / EPA

A group a tourists walk on the snow-covered slopes in Gulmarg, a skiing resort, some 30 miles from Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian Kashmir on Dec. 20.

Romania

Vadim Ghirda / AP

A Romanian homeless man eats hot soup received from a charity organization in Bucharest, Romania, on Dec. 20. There are an estimated 5,000 people in Bucharest in conditions so precarious that 300 die a year from the cold and illness.

Siberia

Ilya Naymushin / Reuters

A person crosses the newly-frozen Shumikha bay of the Yenisei River while the air temperature was approximately -13F, near the village of Khmelniki, some 30 miles south of the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk, Russia, Dec. 20.

The temperature in Siberia is reaching lows not felt in more than half a century as the mercury dips to 42 degrees below zero and the air instantly freezes boiling water. NBCNews.com's Dara Brown reports.